Thanksgiving (part 1)

This Thanksgiving, Dave and I were grateful for the opportunity to visit my parents in Arizona.

We debated about how many cars to take. My older sister, her husband, and my younger sister were all going to AZ, too, so we wanted to carpool. In the end we chose to take one car, since we wanted to save as much money on gas as possible. We crammed 5 people into a little Honda Civic, and we will not make the mistake of having so many people travel in one car again. I'm not going to say the drive was terrible, but...well, it wasn't a pretty sight, or a jumping-up-and-down happy experience. When there is no space for you to move your legs, you become a grumpy person, simple as that.

We arrived on Wednesday night around 8 or 9pm and hung out for a while before going to bed. Dave and I got to sleep on a mattress on the floor of the living room, but it wasn't too uncomfortable. The worst of it was that the cats tried to sleep on us.

On Thursday, some of us spent time in the kitchen cooking for the big Thanksgiving feast we would have later with my aunt and cousins (and 2nd cousins). I made a few fun things like cranberry sauce and sweet potato crunch. As it turns out, my extended family has become so large that my aunt held the Thanksgiving meal in a church cultural hall. Kind of strange, but it worked.

We arrived around 3pm and said hi to our relatives. We made some finishing touches on the food and then we were ready to eat. Oooh yeah, was it good! It was great to spend time with relatives and enjoy a great meal! Several of my cousins sat around a table afterward and worked on the "plan of attack" for Shop Til You Drop, a tradition in my family, although it is a crazy one. I had already flipped through the ads and knew what I was interested in (although there wasn't much I was really planning to buy...it was mostly about the "family bonding" aspect of the whole thing). I haven't really done this Black Friday thing, I mean, REALLY done it, in years, and the plan was to get up at 3am and be at Kohl's before 4am.

That night, we played games with my family and watched "Fiddler on the Roof" (I know, it's a real Thanksgiving classic, right?) as we munched on delectable leftovers and enjoyed each other's company. The three of us insane people who were going to go shopping in the morning tried to go to bed early.

At the crack of 3am my mom woke up my sister and me, and we were off on our shopping adventure. First we stopped at Kohl's, where my aunt was holding a place in line outside the door. As we entered the store, the shoppers were remarkably courteous and no one was trampled or shoved at all. We found what we needed and moved along to the next stop: Wal-Mart.

Now, we all know what Wal-Mart is like on any given Saturday, so just try to imagine the vision of horror that played out on Black Friday. It was like the flood gates opened and people completely lost their self control as they raged down the aisles. I felt like I was stranded on a tree limb amidst a flash flood as I stood guarding my mom's cart with my sister cringing by my side. Ah, commercialism. It's SUCH a wonderful thing...

Okay, a little overdramatic, perhaps. Anyway, we made a couple more stops before we were too exhausted to go on. I didn't buy much, really, but it was really fun to hang out with my mom, sister, and other relatives.

We arrived back home around 8am, just as the rest of the family was waking up. I collapsed onto the mattress and slept for a good 3 or 4 hours before I was ready to be a functional human again. Ship Til You Drop is not for the faint of heart, I assure you. (Honestly, it is only for the very insane)

We spent the day visiting relatives. That evening we went to see my cousin and his fiancee. Some of us stayed later and played games with them and roasted marshmallows in their fire pit, and it was a blast!

In the morning, Larissa and her husband went to visit family, and Jana, Dave and I went to Trader Joe's to shop. That night I made dinner (veggie soup) and we watched "King Kong" (I needed to watch it for my theory class) and played Phase 10.

We left in the morning. It was a tough ride home, but we made it! It was sad to leave my family in Arizona.

So, all in all, it was a wonderful holiday!